The Chicago Blackhawks were the full hockey embodiment of the Undertaker sitting up out of the coffin GIF against the Nashville Predators on Wednesday night in the 5-4 overtime comeback win. The victory was a defibrillator to their Stanley Cup Playoff chances and was helped along with a win by the Detroit Red Wings over the Dallas Stars last night. Heading into Friday night’s season series finale against the Predators, the Blackhawks sit just one point behind the Stars and three points behind Nashville. A win, in regulation preferably, would put them ahead of Dallas on points and within striking distance of the Predators with just eight games remaining.
I’m not going to lie to you, I got my second COVID vaccine shot yesterday and just about 24 hours later, the soreness and body aches are hitting me. So this will be short and sweet and to the point.
The Chicago Blackhawks will not make the playoffs if they lose this game tonight against the Nashville Predators. They are 0-4-2 in six meeting this season and anymore dropped points, while the Dallas Stars continue to gain points and have games in-hand of the Blackhawks, will be the final nail in their postseason coffin.
• Chicago is coming off a 5-2 loss to the Predators in which they allowed four goals in a combined one minute and nine seconds. Kevin Lankinen was pulled for the first time this season, and the Predators put their clamps on the Blackhawks offensively. It’s been the same script pretty much all season between Chicago and Nashville and if we get an encore tonight, it’s over.
The term “One Goal” has a completely different meaning with in the Chicago Blackhawks organization than in the way I’m going to use it today.
For the NHL Trade Deadline this year, Chicago had one goal in mind and that was to get more draft capital and more young, project-type players (with all that juicy, attendant upside that makes trying the “project” worth it). Fortunately, Stan Bowman did just that as the clock struck 2:00 p.m. on Monday and the Blackhawks converted their final four trades of the 2021 season.
Stan Bowman on Blackhawks trades: We re happy with how it went… It s really been consistent with what we ve been trying to do going back to the offseason: we re trying to rebuild our asset pool… We did what we set out to do.
The Chicago Blackhawks got a 4-3 overtime win over the Columbus Blue Jackets on Monday night. But while the win was very much needed, it came at a price to Blackhawks defenseman Adam Boqvist.
Early in the first period, Boqvist took a puck to the mouth/jaw area after it deflected off of his stick. He headed to the dressing room but never returned to the game. After the game, Blackhawks head coach Jeremy Colliton revealed that Boqvist was experiencing concussion-like symptoms.
Jeremy Colliton said Adam Boqvist is dealing with concussion symptoms. #Blackhawks
Boqvist has been having a quality second year of his NHL career, with 15 points in 31 games this season.
Yesterday was a grind, but it was a good day overall. The Chicago Blackhawks did exactly what they had to do at the NHL Trade Deadline and then went out and did exactly what they had to do against the Columbus Blue Jackets. A win-win-win day for Stan Bowman and the Blackhawks organization. You don’t see that all too often.
• For the Trade Deadline, the Blackhawks have all season preached about investing in the long-term future and young players in their system. When push came to shove in the final two weeks leading up to and including yesterday, Chicago did just what they said they would do and built-up their future prospect pool or talent and draft capital.